Five actors move around an almost empty theater stage carrying ubiquitous gray building bricks; they are costumed in jeans, skirts, shirts, and blouses that have been dyed to produce a whitish mottled coloring, as if covered in brick dust from construction work. Gradually, at center-front stage, they collectively construct a single-layer square platform of bricks—a stage on a stage. Standing side by side behind the square of bricks, the actors leap into the air in unison, gesturing upward. Together they take a step onto the brick stage, facing the audience square on.

—It was the day of the fiesta of our lord Huitzilopochtli. We were celebrating in the temple…. The plaza was full of people …

—There were snipers on the roofs.

—Those who were going to kill us covered one hand with a white glove.

—Suddenly there was a gunshot in the distance. We didn’t know where it came from.

—“Get down!” someone shouted. “They’re going to kill us!”

— They closed the eagle entrance in the smaller palace … and when it was closed, they all took their positions.

—The plaza was a mousetrap.

The actors gaze out into the darkness of the auditorium, staring directly at the audience, as intensive bright lights shine in their faces, illuminating expressions of fear and terror. Pressed together they form a tight cluster of bodies. Standing huddled, the bodies push, touch, crouch, and lean sideways, falling … falling as one body, in slow motion, bodies contorted, awkward, one on top of the other, heads falling slowly down to the ground.

—I remember perfectly the blood running down the forehead of someone who was by my side.